Gum Drop Celestial Frontier is a physics based shooter where the biggest surprise is that you donât actually shoot anything because the key to surviving a wave of inbound enemies is to smash them instead. The moment you load up the game, the saying âDonât judge a book by its coverâ springs to mind since it has a web style interface that looks a bit bland, but the game does provide hours of fun and certainly stands out from the crowd.

The game was developed by Elbert Perez, who took about a year to complete it with each stage of the development updates being posted on his official blog. He took Game Design and Development at Full Sail University in Florida and has a passion for gaming.

You play the game as very small spaceship which has the task of sweeping away enemies in outer space, but not in the traditional way you would expect. To survive you have to grapple space objects and swing them around to smash into approaching enemies. As well as thinking about your own spaceship you have to support your base mothership by capturing the Gum Drops around you. By taking them back to base it can defend itself using different weapons and power-ups associated with the Gum Drop.

Initially the game starts off quite easy, in fact too easy to be honest and youâll be skipping through different levels in no time. The further on you get where you just hit that point where you think youâve nailed controlling, swinging and grappling all at the same time, the game does become more increasingly challenging. To get the best possible gameplay from Gum Drop Celestial Frontier, start on Insane mode by changing the difficulty levels.

If the jazzy game music and impressive space backdrops wasnât enough alone to help improve the gameplay experience â you are challenged to unlock a âSurvival Modeâ This is only achievable by completing every level in the game which adds even more longevity to get you coming back for more! The game would sit well with anyone who is a fan of Geometry Wars, and could best be described as the ultimate low cost alternative. Smashing your enemies adds an unusual twist where simply shooting them would become a bore â itâs certainly more challenging.

For only 200 MS Points, there really is nothing much to complain about, however most games do have their faults. To improve the game further it would have been nice to see 2 player options or head to head scoring in multiplayer. Some gamers may find it a little repetitive the further you progress, but overall an enjoyable game where you certainly get more than your money’s worth!

Since Gum Drop Celestial Frontier is free to try, click here to add it to your console download queue.